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The fashion industry is the second biggest polluter in the world. Major brands are exploiting garment workers and harming the environment in the production of shoes and clothing. However, there has been a rise in sustainable fashion brands, making everything from sportswear to underwear who are putting people and the planet before profit.

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As food & drink prices continue to rise across the world, it is often the producers and workers who are losing out to big corporations. We shine a light on the food sovereignty movement pushing for a fairer food system that supports local business and we comment on the rise of veganism.

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Many of the issues from our homes & garden are often hidden from the consumer, from toxic chemicals in our cleaning products to pesticides in our garden. We look at the greenest way to wash, clean and cook and how to recycle your old appliances.

The mainstream banking & insurance industries continue to invest in shady investments such as fossil fuels and nuclear weapons. However, a growing number of ethical alternatives makes it easier than ever to switch to a sustainable bank account or pick an insurance company with an ethical policy.

We look at shops or online platforms that sell a range of products, and how they tend to dominate the market by implementing a profit-first business model and by having a lacklustre approach to ethical practice. We also celebrate ethical companies offering an alternative, from online retailers to sustainable fashion brands.

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The tech sector is plagued by reports of tax avoidance, corporate lobbying and the use of conflict minerals. We look at the brands proving that technology can be made ethically, from Fairphone to Green ISP.

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Are you a lover of the outdoors? Unfortunately the companies that provide your outdoor gear & transport are often harming the environment; from car companies cheating emission tests to outdoor gear companies using toxic chemicals that damage the environment. We provide practical information for consumers on how to keep your ethics while you travel.

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In October 2016, Ethical Consumer viewed an article by Reuters dated 28 August 2015, titled, "Pentagon teams up with Apple, Boeing to develop wearable tech". The article stated, "U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter awarded $75 million on Friday to help a consortium of high-tech firms and researchers develop electronic systems packed with sensors flexible enough to be worn by soldiers or molded onto the skin of a plane." "The technology also could ultimately be used to integrate sensors directly onto the surfaces of ships or warplanes, allowing real-time monitoring of their structural integrity."
As such Apple lost a whole mark under Arms and Military Supply.

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In August 2018 Ethical Consumer sent Apple a questionnaire requesting details of its supply chain management. No response was received and the company's website was searched. Documents were found including the 2018 Supplier Responsibility Report, on the basis of which the company was rated as follows:

Supply chain policy (reasonable)
The company's Supplier Code of Conduct was dated 1 January 2018. The Code stated that it applied to "Apple suppliers and their subsidiaries, afliates, and subcontractors (each a “Supplier”) providing goods or services to Apple, or for use in or with Apple products."

It included adequate clauses on child labour, working hours, forced labour, freedom of association, and discrimination. It did not guarantee payment of a living wage. Apple was considered to have reasonable supply chain policy.

Stakeholder engagement (rudimentary)
Apple's Progress Report 2018 was viewed, which stated that the company was working with a multi-stakeholder initiative to improve its tin supply chain, however it did not appear that it was working with organisations on labour standards in its manufacturing. Apple mentionned anonymous complaint systems that encourage workers to report workplace violations and retaliations . Overall Apple received a rudimentary rating for stakeholder engagement.

Auditing and reporting (poor)
Apple stated that "in 2017, we conducted 756 assessments in 30 countries, covering 95 percent of our total spend". However, there was no disclosure of audit results at factory or supplier level - although there was discussion about overall audit findings. There was no clear schedule of audits, nor a statement it would audit its whole supply chain, nor mention of the costs of audits. The remediation strategy included a Corrective Action Plan. Because of the lack of detail given, Apple was considered to have a poor approach to auditing and reporting.

Difficult issues (reasonable)
A difficult issue within the electronics industry is child labour. Apple detailed how it required suppliers - if they were found to be using child labour - to commit to a remediation strategy of returning the child back to their home and supporting them. Only two cases were found in 2017.
Another difficult issue it was addressing was the use of third-party recruiters to secure contract workers. Apple required suppliers to reimburse fees back to the workers.
Apple was considered to be addressing some of the difficult issues within its supply chain therefore it was considered to have a reasonable approach to difficult issues.

Given that Apple was rated poor for auditing and reporting, rudimentary for stakeholder engagement and reasonable for supply chain policy and difficult issues, it received a middle rating for Supply Chain Management.

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An article published on the Guardian website on 27 July 2015 raised concerns about the marketing tactics of childrens' games manufacturers.

It mentioned a case in 2014 when Apple announced it would refund $32.5m to parents who’d been billed for unauthorised in-app purchases made by their children in order to settle a dispute with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC).

The article stated that in 2013 aggressive monetisation techniques such as requiring a real-life purchase during a game to continue play had caught the attention of the UK’s Office of Fair Trading (which had since become the Competition and Markets Authority). The CMA had launched an investigation into the way in-app purchases were marketed to children. It expressed concerns that some companies were attempting to exploit “children’s inexperience, vulnerability and credulity, including by aggressive commercial practices” such as “direct exhortations to children to buy advertised products” or persuading their parents to do so for them. It subsequently published a set of principles designed to remind developers of their responsibilities under consumer protection law.
The Children’s Rights and Business Principles, developed by UNICEF, the UN Global Compact and Save the Children, were also applicable to video games. Principle Five, for example, required companies to ensure that their “products and services are safe, and seek to support children’s rights through them”. Additionally, Principle Six called for marketing and advertising that respected and supported children’s rights.

The article noted that the fact that the CMA recently referred three online children’s games to the Advertising Standards Authority due to concerns that they may be pressuring children into buying extra features suggested that some developers of children’s apps were unaware of the principles and guidelines that applied to their products - or were choosing to ignore them.

Even when developers did follow available guidance, the default settings on mobile devices could still catch people out, it said. Parents and children weren’t always aware that every app or in-app purchase opens a 15 minute window when further purchases can be made, as with the case of Apple above.

As such Apple lost half a mark under Irresponsible Marketing

Reference:

Responsiblities of the gaming industry in protecting children's rights (27 July 2015)

In August 2013 Reuters reported that the prosecutor's office in Paris, France, had launched a preliminary investigation into the U.S. National Security Agency's Prism surveillance program after French rights groups complained it was snooping on citizens' emails and phone calls.
The groups filed their complaint against "persons unknown" but named Apple as a potential accomplice of the NSA and FBI.
As such Apple lost half a mark under Human Rights.

Reference:

French prosecutor investigates U.S. Prism spying scheme (11 September 2013)

In August 2018, Ethical Consumer viewed the family tree for Apple Inc, on the corporate website www.hoovers.com, which stated that the company had subsidiaries in the following countries: India, China and Thailand. These countries were considered by Ethical Consumer to be oppressive regimes at the time of writing.
As such Apple lost half a mark under Human Rights.

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In August 2018 Ethical Consumer viewed Apple Inc's 2017 SEC Filing SD form which dealt with the issue of conflict minerals. Conflict minerals are minerals mined in conditions of armed conflict and human rights abuses, notably in the eastern provinces of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). The minerals in question are Tantalum, Tin, Tungsten and Gold (3TG for short) and are key components of electronic devices, from mobile phones to televisions.

Ethical Consumer expected any company manufacturing electronics to have a policy on the sourcing of conflict minerals.

Apple stated: "Apple will continue to responsibly source conflict minerals throughout its supply chain and press for continuous improvements in industry-wide due diligence approaches and human rights–focused practices to make a positive impact on the lives of people living in the DRC and adjoining countries." Ethical Consumer took this to be a statement of intent to stay sourcing from the DRC.

The company was a member of several initiatives such as Conflict Free Sourcing Initiative. Apple supported the efforts of other Third Party Audit programs, such as those carried out by the London Bullion Market Association (the “LBMA”), the Responsible Jewellery Council and ITRI through its Tin Supply Chain Initiative (“iTSCi”), to be better aligned with the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development Due Diligence Guidance for Responsible Supply Chains of Minerals from Conflict-Affected and High-Risk Areas (“OECD Guidance”)."

Apple's suppliers were required to to adopt a robust conflict minerals policy as stapilated in Apple's Supplier Code of Conduct. The company used OECD Guidance as a way to track, assess and respond to risks within its supply chain and required suppliers to source minerals from smelters which had been verified as compliant.
Apple's SD form had a full list of smelters and refiners (SORs). It had also achieved 100% of its smelters in its supply chain as being verified compliant.

Overall Apple received Ethical Consumer's best rating for its conflict minerals report.

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The BBC News website, www.bbc.co.uk, was viewed by Ethical Consumer in July 2013. It reported accusations against Apple of violating at least 86 workers' rights within several Chinese factories. These factories were owned by one of the company's suppliers- the Pegatron Group- who assembled iPads and iPhones. According to Chinese Labour Watch, “three factories of Pegatron violated a great number of international and Chinese laws and standards as well as the standards of Apple's own social responsibility code of conduct”. These were said to include under-age labour, contract violations,insufficient wages, abuse by management, poor working conditions and excessive working hours, with an average working week of 66, 67 and 69 hours within the three factories under investigation.

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A company in Suqian, China, called Catcher, making iPhone and iPad parts was found to have a number of serious health and safety, environmental, and human rights violations, as was revealed in a new investigative report. The investigation was conducted in August 2014 and released on 4th September 2014 by the non-profit organizations China Labor Watch (CLW) and Green America.
CLW investigated the Catcher Sujian factory in April 2013 and found many of the same violations. At that time, CLW reported its findings to Apple privately, after which Apple committed to reforming some of the problems. The new report showed that in the 16 months, Apple had not made progress with this supplier to improve conditions for its workers. In spite of Apple’s supplier code of conduct and commitments to prevent these violations, more than a year later, they persist. These findings were in violation of Chinese law and Apple’s Supplier Code of Conduct.
The factory, which employed 20,000, was not one of Apple’s 18 Final Assembly Plants in China, and therefore was not one of the facilities where Apple had recently committed to a policy to ban the use of benzene and n-hexane in manufacturing.
Violations found at Catcher Suqian included the following:
•Significant amounts of aluminum-magnesium alloy shreddings on the floor and dust particles in the air (this dust is both flammable and combustible). Lack of proper ventilation poses a health and fire safety risk
•Inadequate personal protective equipment (PPE) for handling toxic materials, such as metal cutting fluids. Skin is exposed directly to these toxins and there are no ventilator masks
•Locked safety exits. There was no means of rapid egress if there is a fire or explosion.
•Workers had not participated in fire drills in the past year
•A lack of safety training for workers
• Dumping of industrial fluids and waste into groundwater and nearby rivers
•Many student workers (16-18 years old) are employed in the same positions as adults, 10+ hour days
•Excessive hours for all workers, including student interns
•Forced overtime. Workers were not allowed to turn down requests they work overtime. An estimated 6 hours of unpaid overtime per worker per month (Roughly $290,000 in owed wages for all employees)
•Hiring discrimination based on age and presence of tattoos
•A grievance process that retaliates against workers for raising valid workplace issues
Green America and CLW called on Apple to do what was necessary to ensure that workers making Apple products were treated according to law and Apple’s own social responsibility commitments.
As a result, Apple lost half a mark under Pollution and Toxics, and a whole mark under Workers Rights.

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Research from Danish organisation DanWatch published in November 2013 found that none of the 10 mobile phone or computer manufacturers that they investigated could guarantee that they do not use gold mined by children.
DanWatch investigated the policies of Apple and found that it is not monitoring its gold supply chains to the extent that it could ensure there is no child labour connected to the gold it uses. It has no procedures to identify child labour in its gold supply chain.
The DanWatch report entitled "Child-mined gold in your gadgets?" describes how children from the age of 6 years work in small unauthorized mines in Mali and Ghana. These countries are among the largest exporters of gold in Africa.
In a statement on their website DanWatch said "It is normal in Mali and Ghana that children participate in the work in gold mines, risking both their health and lives. In the gold mines, children are digging deep, insecure mine shafts and work underground in shifts of up to ten hours. In Mali, it is estimated that between 20,000 and 40,000 children are working in gold mines, while there are no numbers available in Ghana. Worldwide, it is estimated that at least 1,5 million children are working in the gold mine industry."
Child workers in the mines are at risk of mercury poisoning. The metal is used to extract gold from the ore. Mercury attacks the central nervous system and can cause chronic disabilities, especially in children, because their bodies are developing and therefore particularly vulnerable to heavy metal.